Basil, Hudson undercut Wimal!

 Monday, 28 July 2014 

Giving an interview to yesterday’s (27) Silumina newspaper, economic development minister Basil Rajapaksa has said,

“Now Hudson….think my child is studying for the exam with the light of a kerosene lamp. When I go to the town, I can see children in big houses with 10 to 12 air-conditioners and lighted with bulbs. But, my child does not have electricity to study for the exam. Then, I will definitely begin to hate and oppose.”

Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation chairman Hudson Samarasinghe has not questioned the minister about whose children he was speaking. Because, Hudson knows that Basil’s children are all leading luxurious lives in luxury homes in the US. Hudson has not at least asked as to who were the children in big houses with 10 to 12 air-conditioners and lighted with bulbs, because the entire country knows that they are Wimal’s children.

In the interview, Basil goes on to say,

“See, on the other hand, from the media. In the past, there were competent authorities. Newspapers were banned. Sealed. Set on fire. Then, censorship was imposed on newspapers. Today, those do not happen. Today, there are daily newspapers. There are weekly newspapers. There are rag-sheets. In the past, rag-sheets were written on a piece of paper and pasted. Today, these are in the internet. In the websites. Today, there are no more rag-sheets than that. There is no right to oppose. There should be opposition only if these rag-sheets are halted.”

It is very clear that minister Basil is not commenting about newspapers in Sri Lanka. That is because, he should not be unaware of the number of journalists murdered and the media institutions set on fire and the censorship imposed during their regime. In a country where arms were taken up in a situation in which democracy is impossible, minister Basil is a baby who cannot understand that rag-sheets appear in the internet due to censorship and repression of the media.

Hudson has begun the interview by asking – Lanka’s opposition does not behave like an opposition in a democracy? Really, there is no opposition in Sri Lanka? The opposition has broken up? The opposition is split?

This Hudson Samarasinghe who is asking these question is the same person who had contested the 1989 general election from Colombo on the UNP ticket by claiming himself to be the ‘little Premadasa’ in his poster campaign. Economic development minister Basil Rohana Rajapaksa is the only UNP member in the Rajapaksa family. During the UNP regime he was a public relations officer at the Mahaweli Development Ministry of which the late Gamini Dissanayake was the minister.

As such, two renowned UNP members have spoken about the present tragedy faced by the SLFP, a senior minister of the SLFP told us.